Anti-Muslim monk faces sedition charge in Myanmar

YANGON, Myanmar

A Myanmar court issued an arrest warrant late Tuesday for a firebrand anti-Muslim radical monk after a sedition charge was filed against him.

A government official in Yangon Western District Court filed a lawsuit against Wirathu, described by Time magazine as "the Face of Buddhist Terror" for anti-Muslim sentiment, said Col. Myo Thu from police headquarters in Nay Pyi Taw on Wednesday.

“The judge accepted it and issued arrest warrant late Tuesday,” he told Anadolu Agency.

The warrant was issued by a judge for attempts to excite disaffection toward the Myanmar government, said Myo Thu, adding the charge carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment, fine or both.

“However, the police so far have not arrested him,” he said, without giving details on the delay.

Senior government officials recently were quoted by local media that the monk would be persecuted after a video clip in which Wirathu verbally attacked State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi during a speech – went viral earlier this month.

Wirathu was at his monastery in Myanmar’s second largest city, Mandalay, Monday and no police showed up, according to one of his devotee Aung Kyaing.

“He is now on the way to Yangon as senior monk council summoned him,” Kyaing told Anadolu Agency, referring to the Sangha Committee that banned Wirathu from preaching for one year in mid-2017.

Wirathu, who once called himself "the Buddhist Bin Laden," has taken a leading role in spreading anti-Muslim sentiment among the country’s Buddhist majority since communal violence broken out in Rakhine State in mid-2012.